Is philosophy relevant to science?

[md65536]

Do you think that Earth might be flattened, as per SR theory (length contraction), or do you know that it is close to spherical? The latter is true by the best Earth science of direct observation. Take your pick. A flattened Earth is simply nonsense, based on a very stupid theory that objects have no shape on their own but rather depend, for their shape, on how they are observed. Think about it and decide for yourself.

Very similar to:

Btw, before I take off for the weekend (or while I am gone) will you please answer the following, now posed for the third time... very relevant to the "length contraction" part of relativity theory:

"Do you really, truly deny that "...the distance to the Sun (remains) around 93 million miles, regardless of who is flying by at whatever speed measuring it?"...

or that a squished nearly flat shape of Earth is equally valid with the well established nearly spherical shape?

Very similar to:

I'm gone for a long weekend after checking in tomorrow morning, so I want to ask an important question before go, just to simplify the issue presented in this thread, and I will post this before reading anymore replies from this afternoon. (Tired of the level of quibbling here with dogmatic believers in length contraction.)

 

[...] let me ask the forum a sincere question:

Is earth a very nearly spherical body or is it a severely oblate spheroid, say with diameter through the equator 1/8 th the diameter through the poles, or vice-versa, depending on frame of reference?

Very similar to:

I asked (again) recently if anyone actually believes that earth's diameter or earth-sun distance actually varies with different frames of reference from which they are measured. Apparently no one wants to look foolish enough to affirm contraction/expansion of that diameter or the one AU distance, but relativity's "length contraction" insists on their variability.

You ask this question over and over but you don't accept any of the answers that people give.

 

Philosophy (ontology) asks what it is. Science asks how it works,without asking what it is. Call "it" anything, and make it a part of the math equation. Don't even ask what it is. Ontology asks what it is.

Both philosophy and science are concerned with the answers to questions. You do not seem concerned with answers. Are you sure what you're doing is philosophy?

You've mentioned that philosophy of science is interested in knowing how we know what we know. But you don't seem concerned with even knowing what questions can be answered. You'll ask questions over and over again regardless.

I might consider it some form of meditation to repeat unanswerable questions over and over, but your posts seem to me more about the statements than about contemplating questions.

I still don't know what your goal is. Are you "enlightening us" with questions but no answers? Or are you waiting for someone to come along and say "You were right all along and Einstein and everyone after him were wrong!", and then for that elusive genius to give definitive answers to all the meaningless questions you incessantly ask ("What is IT that curves?")? These are questions for which you've never provided a lead in to a discussion of any answers.

 

Science does fine without your questions. It has its own questions and it actually works toward answering them. What is the goal of the questions you ask? Have you even begun to figure out how one would go about answering them, let alone actually tried to answer them? You ignore answers, and then ask again. Is there any progress being made?

 

Feynman--"Philosophy is bullshit"....

Not always!

But plenty of evidence in this thread for how it can be.

[tar]

Philosophy (ontology) asks what it is. Science asks how it works,without asking what it is. Call "it" anything, and make it a part of the math equation. Don't even ask what it is. Ontology asks what it is.

 

TAR:

 

 

My understanding of science has always been the objective inquiry into the reality of cosmos, "the thing in itself", objectively, the best we can know transcending subjective perception, or even abstract varieties of observation from extreme frames of reference.

No intention of a "trap." A strange perception of my motives.

 

Do you think that Earth might be flattened, as per SR theory (length contraction), or do you know that it is close to spherical? The latter is true by the best Earth science of direct observation. Take your pick. A flattened Earth is simply nonsense, based on a very stupid theory that objects have no shape on their own but rather depend, for their shape, on how they are observed. Think about it and decide for yourself.

 

Owl,

 

If you remember, early on I was very much on your side on this, suggesting what shape the flyby guy would see the Earth if he swung around and passed by again at a 90 degree different angle and so on. I then "learned" what the equations where telling us. That if the speed of light is constant, time dilation and length contraction MUST be the case. And indeed the Earth would be squished in the "other" direction on the second pass. If we are to see the traveler as shortened in the direction of his travel, then the traveler must see us as shortened as well, because we are passing by HIM at incredible velocities, and as far as he can tell, since he an his ship are stationary in regards to each other, everything is perfectly correctly shaped, locally. And to him, these oblate sphereoid things he sees flying toward him is what reality looks like. EVERYTHING zooming past him looks like that. That must be how they are "really", objectively shaped.

 

Plus I just realized that he probably can not turn around and approach from a "different" angle without some acceleration, that would change the equations. (I think somebody mentioned that at the time, but I just got it.)

 

Anyway. The Earth stays spherical to anybody with no relative velocity to it. This fact ensures its oblateness to anything or anybody that it "passes" at a high velocity (near C). At least that is the way I understand what has been discovered about how the universe works.

 

Remember that the model of the universe you have in your mind has the same abstract nature to it, as the model in SwansonT's mind. You both depend on sense experience to inform you of "what is real". 'Cept SwansonT believes what he sees. You believe what you imagine you should see.

 

If SwansonT is going by the observations and experiments that suggest a mathematically consistent spacetime geometry, that allows for, no, that demands time dilation and length contraction be the case, if C is to remain constant...then that is what observations and experiments "tell us" is the case. It is the way it "looks" to be.

Nobody is "making it up", they are reporting what they have found to be the case.

 

If you are going to have faith in the observations and measurements of others, that tell you, you are living on a sphere, why stop believing them at a point of your choice. For four generations reality has looked more and more to be as relativity theory describes it.

 

AND the speed of light is very very fast and the solar system is very very huge. It is hard to model such, "realistically" in ones mind using no math, just using a "feeling" that this or that has to be the case. It is more likely that what the math says are the actual relationships, ARE the actual relationships than what you guess/figure have to be the actual relationships, are the actual relationships.

 

If you are going to figure. Why not go with what the actual figures say?

Regards, TAR2

Edited December 13, 2011 by tar

[owl]

PeterJ:

Yes, but if you're right it would make no difference to SR, I hope I'm right to say.

To say that the observer travelling a higher speeds would see a flattened Earth is

not to say that the Earth is flattened. it is to say that the observer's view of the

world is affected by the speed he is travelling at. It is an observer effect,

surely, and not the idea that Earth can have more than one shape at a time.

 

Please read my last posts in my realism vs idealism thread in Philosophy section, "Frame of Reference as Subject in Subjective Idealism."

Our fearless leader and swansont, among others believe that a flattened Earth is just as valid as a spherical Earth.

Examples:

Me:

Do you agree that the above means that there is no objective, as-it-is shape of Earth?

 

Cap ‘n R:

Not across all reference frames, no.

 

That was a “no” with the qualifier that shape depends on frame of reference.

Length contraction theory does indeed claim that (my repeated summary) there is no objective, as-is shape of Earth. Frames of reference determine reality.

 

This also applies to the distances between stars, as I illustrated with the example of the distance to Alpha Centauri. It is in fact, 4.3 light years away. It takes light 4.3 years to travel from there to here. A high speed spaceship can not get there faster that light so the “time dilation” (for the spaceship) argument applies to the clocks on the ship slowing down. The reciprocal of that, length contraction, claims that its speed makes the distance shorter than 4.3 light years away. If this claim were true cosmos would have no reality of its own. (The ontological inquiry into cosmos.) It’s all about how we see it in that case. This is an example of the idealism of frames of reference claiming a reality which denies the astronomy of the above “actual distance” to our nearest neighbor star.

 

No, the ship really can’t travel faster than light and get there in a fraction of 4.3 years.

 

Now to Cap 'n R's last questions to me.

Me:

I personally doubt if science-as-we-know-it will ever devise an experiment to explain how the force of gravity acts between objects at a distance. If it continues to depend on "whatever...", as metaphysical stuff that can not be identified, we might as well just go metaphysical all the way and say that "consciousness" is the power behind all of it. But that leaves material science behind.,i.e., not its universe of discourse. I, for one, will not go there in a science forum.

Cap ‘n R

My question is more "do you think it is possible for such an experiment or test to exist?", not "do you think anyone would carry such an experiment out?" The answer is the key to this discussion.

 

I don’t understand the question. “An experiment” must be “carried out” to exist, as I understand what an experiment is. ... Unless it is a "thought experiment” like I just “carried

out” again above regarding distance to Alpha Centauri, and travel time to get there at sub- lightspeed.

 

I think that the mystery of how masses are mutually attracted at a distance is beyond material science, struggling as it is with essentially metaphysical concepts like curved spacetime and gravitons. And “consciousness” is not a subject for material science.

There is work out there, like “The Intention Experiment” by Lynne McTaggart and The Journal of Consciousness Studies, which are often not well received by present day material science, but I think such studies will be the “wave of the future.”

 

An afterthought:

The above (continuing) argument about Earth's shape and the distance to Alpha Centauri is an example of the branch of epistemology (philosophy) base on reason, the a-priori branch as distinct from the a-posteriori branch based on sense data, inducted into emprical observation.

Just the philosophical context for my above argument.

It is what it is regardless of how we see it.

(realism.)

How to best 'see it' is about experimental design. I've studied that in a lot of cases. Even my "Logic and the Scientific Method" class had an 'experimental' design' section for undergrad wanna be scientists.

(For those all about credentials.)

Edited December 14, 2011 by owl

[tar]

Owl,

 

No, the ship really can’t travel faster than light and get there in a fraction of 4.3 years.

 

No, the ship really can’t travel faster than light and get there in a fraction of 4.3 years.

 

 

But in your thought experiment, you have to change all variables that are changing, AND retain all relationships that exist REALLY in the REAL world (local part of the galaxy) in a manner that keeps things that HAVE to be the case, the case. The universe, every piece and part of it, will HAVE to have experienced every instance of spacetime it occupied in the 8.6 (plus) years of the ships journey to Alpa Centuri and back. This is not hard to imagine for Alpha C. which is in our frame of reference, simply 4.3 lys distant. But we have to imagine the ship's instances of spacetime coordinates along which it is constantly existing during the trip in a manner that will "hold to" reality, which is very "difficult" to picture in your mind, and carry out realistically, without the assistance of mathematical equations that will "stand for" reality and vary where relationships will vary, and stay consistent where relationships will stay the same.

If given the choice between imagining what has to happen on such a trip, to keep reality real, and putting it down on paper to see what actually has to happen for reality to continue to behave consistently...I pick the paper and pencil method. Its going to turn out to be MORE realistic.

 

 

Regards, TAR2

[ydoaPs]

Philosophy (ontology) asks what it is. Science asks how it works,without asking what it is

If you think there is a difference, you've not asked "how does it work" enough times.

[owl]

Me:

"Philosophy (ontology) asks what it is. Science asks how it works,without asking what it is."

 

If you think there is a difference, you've not asked "how does it work" enough times.

Take it up with Cap 'n R, Swansont and others here who say that the ontology of 'what it is' is not a question for physics.

 

I've been hammering, for instance, on what it is that makes gravity work, and on the difference between the quantum physics version of 'what it is', "gravitons," and the GR version, "curved spacetime." The Cap 'n has insisted many times that it doesn't matter 'what it is' in the latter case.

So, if they are just metaphysical concepts... what the hell, just different words with no referents? How does mass "bend space," whatever that is, and how does "bent space" make objects follow such curvature?

How do "gravitons" ("massless messenger particles") grab and pull on masses as they attract each other. "What is it?" in each case is very relevant to how "it" works. But the question is dismissed on the 'grounds' that ontology is irrelevant to physics.

 

TAR:

But in your thought experiment, you have to change all variables that are changing, AND retain all relationships that exist REALLY in the REAL world (local part of the galaxy) in a manner that keeps things that HAVE to be the case, the case.

Etc, etc, etc...

In my thought experiment one firsts grants that realistically a spaceship traveling between stars at high speed can not actually make the stars move closer together.

(Edit)

TAR:

I pick the paper and pencil method.

Its going to turn out to be MORE realistic.

So if the math says the ship makes the stars closer together, so be it? And ship's time rules over Earth's orbital time?

 

 

So granted that the clock/calendar on the ship slows down at high speed, and probably all physical processes including human aging, less time will have *seemed to pass* for the spaceship.

So the Cap 'n, being an intelligent man, might declare on arrival in that system, that even though only a fraction of 4.3 years have passed on their ship clock and 'body clocks', yet he knows that he did not exceed lightspeed, which requires 4.3 years for the journey. Hmmm! He can eventually verify that, meanwhile, Earth orbited our Sun more than 8.6 times during his round trip, because he was traveling at sub-lightspeed out and back, and light will make the 'round trip' in 8.6 years.

 

So "time slowed down for the travelers" does not mean that Earth orbited our Sun fewer that 4 times. This is a reality check based on the cosmic overview (edit: precise astronomical measurement,*) not just slowed aging and slowed clock on the ship. Our Sun certainly did not move way closer to Alpha Centauri during the travelers' journey.

*Same applies to the precisely measured average distance Earth to Sun, 93 million miles or 8+ light minutes.) A speeding rocket frame of reference does not change that.

I'm sorry if that contradicts SR.

PS: Light can not be pushed faster by a fast ship, but the ship can travel through the tail end of a light beam it is projecting ahead. So who is measuring lightspeed from what frame of reference using light as a medium for the measurements... is a very tricky 'thought experiment.'

Even with the Michelson/Morley verification practically cast in stone, it leaves science with a choice between "invariant lightspeed" (with very tricky parameters of measurement) and a resulting cosmos that morphs drastically with observation (or can not be accurately measured)... and the "as is" cosmos of realism, requiring the best choice of observational frame in each case.

Edited December 14, 2011 by owl

[ydoaPs]

Take it up with Cap 'n R, Swansont and others here who say that the ontology of 'what it is' is not a question for physics.

So, have a thing. What do we know about the thing? Well, we know how it interacts with other things. From that, we divine several of its properties. This thing has a relatively minuscule mass. This thing has a charge. This thing has a certain spin. What more of "what it is" is there? It is a thing that is a small mass, a charge, and intrinsic momentum. That IS what it is! "What something is" is definitely within the scope of science.

 

If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck. If you're looking for some innate substance behind all the properties, then you're a bit behind in your philosophy.

[swansont]

Me:

"Philosophy (ontology) asks what it is. Science asks how it works,without asking what it is."

 

 

Take it up with Cap 'n R, Swansont and others here who say that the ontology of 'what it is' is not a question for physics.

 

I've been hammering, for instance, on what it is that makes gravity work, and on the difference between the quantum physics version of 'what it is', "gravitons," and the GR version, "curved spacetime." The Cap 'n has insisted many times that it doesn't matter 'what it is' in the latter case.

So, if they are just metaphysical concepts... what the hell, just different words with no referents? How does mass "bend space," whatever that is, and how does "bent space" make objects follow such curvature?

How do "gravitons" ("massless messenger particles") grab and pull on masses as they attract each other. "What is it?" in each case is very relevant to how "it" works. But the question is dismissed on the 'grounds' that ontology is irrelevant to physics.

 

If ydoaPs meant what I think he meant, you completely misinterpreted his response, meaning he doesn't need to take it up with us, he agrees with us (apologies if I have misinterpreted this). Science doesn't answer "how it works" on a fundamental level, either. Science (or at least physics) makes no claim that the model details represent reality. They only claim that the results of those models reflect reality. Gravity could be invisible pink fairies holding us down for all we know, but what we do know is that the way we are held down follows F=GMm/r^2, with some additional tweaks (best viewed with a geometric model) at extreme precision and/or high gravitational strengths.

 

What gets me is the fixation on ontology of spacetime and apparent obliviousness to, basically, all of the rest of physics. Electric and magnetic field lines. Semiconductor holes. Phonons. Wave functions. Quantum states.

 

If one is interested, a good read is David Mermin's "What’s bad about this habit" from the May 2009 Physics Today. I think it's paywalled, but I'm pretty sure one can find bootleg copies out there. It's on the danger of falling into the bad habit of reifying physics constructs. A reminder that physics does not do this, though some physicists occasionally do. Physics models are abstractions, but because of the scientific process they work, so it is very tempting to think they are real. Any critique based on the reification of the models is thus fatally flawed from the outset — it's based on a misunderstanding of science. Science can't answer what it is. When "it's an abstraction" is so thoroughly and masterfully ignored it just leads us to a repeat of the question as has been so exhaustively demonstrated in these several threads.

 

From Mermin's article, lest you think that Cap'n and I are just a few holdouts on the subject.

Notions like dimension or interval, or curvature or geodesics, are properties not of the world we live in but of the abstract geometric constructions we have invented to help us organize events. As Einstein once again put it, “Space and time are modes by which we think, not conditions under which we live.”

[owl]

So, have a thing. What do we know about the thing? Well, we know how it interacts with other things.

 

Let's get very specific. Spacetime may not be a "thing." Maybe it's metaphysical concept. How does "it" interact with the masses that GR claims it does to make it curve, and then how does "it" in turn guide objects in curved paths?

This is repeated from my last post, but you avoided it.

 

From that, we divine several of its properties. This thing has a relatively minuscule mass. This thing has a charge. This thing has a certain spin. What more of "what it is" is there? It is a thing that is a small mass, a charge, and intrinsic momentum. That IS what it is! "What something is" is definitely within the scope of science.

 

Your last statements, as I said, disagree with prevailing philosophy of physics here, that 'what it IS' does not matter.

 

Again from last post, what are the "properties" of "gravitons" as compared with the "properties" of "curved spacetime" that make them act as they do to explain the same observable phenomenon, gravitational attraction between masses?

 

If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck. If you're looking for some innate substance behind all the properties, then you're a bit behind in your philosophy.

 

I am not " looking for some innate substance behind all the properties." I am advocating the application of ontology to what it is they are talking about when they say "Mass curves spacetime." We have a good idea what mass is, down to the a certain sub-atomic level anyway, but we have no idea at all what is supposed to be curved in the above statement.

 

And nobody knows what the hell a "graviton" might be either. Maybe if they repeat these words enough (in both camps) they will take on identities as entities through repetition alone! But probably not.

[md65536]

Let's get very specific. Spacetime may not be a "thing." Maybe it's metaphysical concept. How does "it" interact with the masses that GR claims it does to make it curve, and then how does "it" in turn guide objects in curved paths?

 

Oh! Well that's easy!

 

Let's assume that spacetime is not a "thing", as you will see in the following example that whether or not it "is" a thing is not relevant to the answer to the question (which is itself an answer to this thread's question).

 

If you were to measure lengths in a given curved space, using any consistent method of measuring lengths, you would find that lengths which might be the same in flat space, are measured as different lengths in curved space.

 

If a hypothetical mass moving through this space were also to measure these lengths, it too would find that lengths are not universal, and it would measure lengths that are consistent with what you measure. So you measure that lengths are different, and so does the mass. Lines that are straight from one viewpoint can be curved from another.

 

Now, this hypothetical mass can also "measure lengths" using any consistent method. So it doesn't have to pull out a ruler and use its hands... the simple act of moving through a space can act as a measure of it. And THIS is how the mass "interacts" with the non-thing space that we're imagining: It only has to behave consistently in the space; it behaves over a length as if it has measured that length. Whether or not it actually "does something" to measure it is not important to answer the question. Just like if you walk across a room, the room will be the same length whether you have your eyes open or not (since the universe is consistent), something behaves in space the same whether it is measuring lengths with a ruler or not.

 

 

 

So in the end we have that the mass only have to behave consistently in this space as if it is measuring it to be curved, and it will behave as if the space is curved. It doesn't matter what constitutes the measure. It doesn't matter if it's measuring "no thing", or "something". If it behaves as if curved space is nothing, then curved space might be nothing, but if it also behaves as if curved space is "something", then it might also be something. BUT HERE'S THE POINT of the science vs. purely philosophical questioning: If there's no way to answer (or differentiate, or test) whether one is right and the other is wrong or vice versa, then the question is irrelevant, can't (at least yet) be answered, doesn't make a difference to the behavior of things in that space, does not have to be answered for science to progress, cannot be answered definitively, and is a time-wasting digression from science. That said, of course philosophy in general is relevant to science and even the unanswerable questions can inspire useful scientific questions and ideas.

 

 

 

I'm not a card-carrying scientist and I can only hope that this is correct enough. I'm sure it can be explained better. This is only what I've picked up from the many other answers to your questions, which you could have also done yourself.

[owl]

If ydoaPs meant what I think he meant, you completely misinterpreted his response, meaning he doesn't need to take it up with us, he agrees with us (apologies if I have misinterpreted this). Science doesn't answer "how it works" on a fundamental level, either. Science (or at least physics) makes no claim that the model details represent reality. They only claim that the results of those models reflect reality. Gravity could be invisible pink fairies holding us down for all we know, but what we do know is that the way we are held down follows F=GMm/r^2, with some additional tweaks (best viewed with a geometric model) at extreme precision and/or high gravitational strengths.

 

What gets me is the fixation on ontology of spacetime and apparent obliviousness to, basically, all of the rest of physics. Electric and magnetic field lines. Semiconductor holes. Phonons. Wave functions. Quantum states.

 

"What gets me" is the very cute way that you and Cap 'n R flippantly dismiss the ontology of spacetime... (I believe it is "relevant to science")... as , you know, it could be anything... "pink fairies holding us down" or a rabbit pelt, or some other brown furry thing... 'cuz it really doesn't matter what it is... just how "it" (whatever...) works is the only legitimate question?

So I keep asking, when GR constantly asserts that mass curves spacetime, if you refuse to talk about the ontology, how does that work? Mass curves whatever how, and how does that whatever guide objects in curved paths? (I am not the only one asking. Please don't ask me to cite references yet again.)

(I'll bold below for reference and emphasis.)

 

... It's on the danger of falling into the bad habit of reifying physics constructs. A reminder that physics does not do this, though some physicists occasionally do. Physics models are abstractions, but because of the scientific process they work, so it is very tempting to think they are real. Any critique based on the reification of the models is thus fatally flawed from the outset — it's based on a misunderstanding of science. Science can't answer what it is. When "it's an abstraction" is so thoroughly and masterfully ignored it just leads us to a repeat of the question as has been so exhaustively demonstrated in these several threads.

 

So calling physics models abstracts and constructs now means that they need no referents in the real world or explanation as to how mass effects whatever. It doesn't matter what it effects or how. It also doesn't matter how curved 'whatever' guides observable objects in curved paths, i.e., by what 'mechanism' if it is not just the work of fairies.

 

Likewise, quantum physics can call the gravity agent (whatever) "gravitons," and GR can call "it" curved spacetime, and it doesn't matter in either case what those words mean or how it works as long as the math looks good on paper and predicts the observable effects of gravity.

 

A quite secondary question is... How will we ever know whether the graviton model or the curved spacetime model is correct if they both remain metaphysical mysteries or meaningless nonentities?

Further, when you apply your abstract physics model of SR to the cosmos, you end up with the total nonsense of believing that planets are or may be flattened rather than spherical and that distances between 'real things in the actual cosmos' (excuse the phrase... its ontology...) on all scales from solar systems to distances between stars depend on the math models based on an infinite variety of frames of reference from which "things" and distances between them are observed.

Astounding!

And then you can be content with models and concepts as from Mermin's article like:

Notions like dimension or interval, or curvature or geodesics, are properties not of the world we live in but of the abstract geometric constructions we have invented to help us organize events.

You can "organize events" like distorted planet shapes and distances between stars which deny astronomy, because they are "abstract geometric constructions" and don't need to correspond to the (again excuse the ontology)... "real world."

 

md65536:

If you were to measure lengths in a given curved space, using any consistent method of measuring lengths, you would find that lengths which might be the same in flat space, are measured as different lengths in curved space.

"Curved space" is NOT a GIVEN.

Ignoring the ontology of attributing shape ingeneral to space, calling one version curved and another flat... even though flat describes a plane, not space, in Euclidean geometry/cosmology, which is 3-D, not a plane...

 

and Ignoring the ontology of whether space can have the specific property of curvature... after all GR says that mass curves space...

 

all of that in a thread about whether such philosophical/ontological questions are relevant...

 

And besides all that ignoring, who are ontologists to argue with the established and indisputable facts of physics based on non-Euclidean geometry/cosmology?

 

Stick to the topic or go away.

... and I had sworn off replying to you...

[md65536]

"Curved space" is NOT a GIVEN.

You're right.

It is only consistent with all known measurements and the model of GR. If there were measurements that disagreed, that would be evidence against either GR and/or universal gravitation.

So, philosophically, you can contemplate space that is not curved by the presence of mass, but that doesn't correspond to reality.

 

 

Stick to the topic or go away.

I'm sorry. I was replying to someone's question in the thread, which I thought was on topic. Or is it only the questions that are on topic, and answers are off? I apologize for being slow at learning the rules of threads that belong to you.

 

Likewise, quantum physics can call the gravity agent (whatever) "gravitons," and GR can call "it" curved spacetime, and it doesn't matter in either case what those words mean or how it works as long as the math looks good on paper and predicts the observable effects of gravity.

Yes, and a table is made of atoms. Does that bother you? But what is an atom? And what is a quark?

 

Science has a broad range of ontological answers to the question "what is a table?" but they begin and end with what can be determined experimentally.

 

Can you give me an example of any definitive ontological answer to a question of what something is, where one can't simply take the answer and say "But what IS that?", as you have been doing?

 

 

Edited December 14, 2011 by md65536

[StringJunky]

Here's a A LINK to "What's Bad About This Habit" Swansont referred to earlier if anyone's interested.

 

Owl, you should read this.

Edited December 15, 2011 by StringJunky

[tar]

Owl,

 

Just for the sake of argument. What if, ALL scientists and ALL metaphysicists, and ALL humans in general are after understanding reality. REAL reality, and have approached it from slightly different angles, using different methods.

 

Being that we are all "blind" to the same aspects of reality, the blind men and the elephant story, is not to be dismissed lightly, and teaches us something, about how we should go about understanding the elephant.

 

It REALLY is like a snake. And it REALLY is like a wall.

 

Better in my estimation to figure out what there is to learn about reality if the other guy is correct, than to try and figure out what reality is if the other guy is wrong.

 

Regards, TAR2

[owl]

me:

"Stick to the topic or go away."

md:

I'm sorry. I was replying to someone's question in the thread, which I thought was

on topic. Or is it only the questions that are on topic, and answers are off? I

apologize for being slow at learning the rules of threads that belong to you.

 

Your 'apology' is disingenuous and sarcastic as so many before. Example: You called me a blood sucker ( vampire, I presumed) and an internet troll, for which your were reprimanded by a moderator. You apologized as usual, like before privately as if it were sincere.

You have stalked me persistently through previous forums, as you have listed them here. Here you have always replied to my posts with a nasty attitude and often with personal attacks, usually thinly veiled insults, just enough to avoid the personal abuse rules.

 

I asked then how to ban you from my threads. No way... but I could ignore you, which had been my attention since then. I am genuinely sorry that I suspended that intention for my last reply to you. It will not happen again.

But just to be done with it...

 

Can you give me an example of any definitive ontological answer to a question of what something is, where one can't simply take the answer and say "But what IS that?", as you have been doing?

 

Zero communication here as usual.

Ontology does not ‘give a rat’s ass’ about bickering over definitions and semantics, which seems to be your forte'.

One example of a ”definitive ontological answer to what something is,” just off the top:

 

A hydrogen atom consists of one proton as a nucleus around which one electron “orbits,” if I may use the gravitational term. (And I have already, without permission. )

Subatomic physics tells us more about what that proton is made of and the nature and properties of the electron. And science tells us a lot about the actual properties of hydrogen, an existing element, which I need not belabor here.

Of course, descriptions of ‘what it is and what it’s made of’ get progressively more complicated as we progress through the “table” of elements.

 

The table is just a re-presentation of the elements, btw, not the elements themselves, in case anyone is confused about the difference between the “map and the territory” or the table and *what* it represents in the “real world” of elements.

 

Yes, idealists, there is a real world which models and abstractions (and all those theories) attempt to understand and describe. That was a *philosophical* statement based on realism, which I advocate as very relevant to science.

Edited December 15, 2011 by owl

[ydoaPs]

Tar, if you knew any philosophy at all, you'd know what you're looking for is what Kant would say is "beyond the reach of reason". Physics IS ontology; it's just in a language you don't know, so it's scary.

[tar]

That was addressed to you, and you could take it as an affront, and say "so why should other's not look for how I am right, that together we should be able to see the elephant better'. And you would have a point...except 50 blind men(women) comparing notes is better than one blind man that will not accept the collected notes of a bunch of blind guys.

[swansont]

"What gets me" is the very cute way that you and Cap 'n R flippantly dismiss the ontology of spacetime... (I believe it is "relevant to science")... as , you know, it could be anything... "pink fairies holding us down" or a rabbit pelt, or some other brown furry thing... 'cuz it really doesn't matter what it is... just how "it" (whatever...) works is the only legitimate question?

 

Your arguments make being flippant easy. What you believe is one thing. What you can demonstrate is quite another.

 

So I keep asking, when GR constantly asserts that mass curves spacetime, if you refuse to talk about the ontology, how does that work? Mass curves whatever how, and how does that whatever guide objects in curved paths? (I am not the only one asking. Please don't ask me to cite references yet again.)

(I'll bold below for reference and emphasis.)

 

It would seem that the ones asking are not the ones doing any science. So why should I care? You still have not provided me with a list of science that has been shown not to work based on philosophical objections.

 

So calling physics models abstracts and constructs now means that they need no referents in the real world or explanation as to how mass effects whatever. It doesn't matter what it effects or how. It also doesn't matter how curved 'whatever' guides observable objects in curved paths, i.e., by what 'mechanism' if it is not just the work of fairies.

 

That's right. It doesn't matter. What matters is that the models work.

 

Likewise, quantum physics can call the gravity agent (whatever) "gravitons," and GR can call "it" curved spacetime, and it doesn't matter in either case what those words mean or how it works as long as the math looks good on paper and predicts the observable effects of gravity.

 

A quite secondary question is... How will we ever know whether the graviton model or the curved spacetime model is correct if they both remain metaphysical mysteries or meaningless nonentities?

Further, when you apply your abstract physics model of SR to the cosmos, you end up with the total nonsense of believing that planets are or may be flattened rather than spherical and that distances between 'real things in the actual cosmos' (excuse the phrase... its ontology...) on all scales from solar systems to distances between stars depend on the math models based on an infinite variety of frames of reference from which "things" and distances between them are observed.

Astounding!

 

The way we know is that the model predicts future observations and fits current observations to the level of precision that we can measure. As with the models we have in thermodynamics, kinematics, electrodynamics, quantum mechanics, etc.

 

The description of this physics as "total nonsense" and the observation of "astounding!" evokes an image of someone being told of a technology that's new to them, like a cell phone or even a regular phone back in the day, and they are told that if they talk into it, someone far away would be able to hear them, and they would be able to hear the other person. But it doesn't fit their experience and they decide it can't possibly work. They would call it total nonsense. You think that such a device is real? Astounding! Things don't happen like that in the real world! But, of course, just because they can't conceive of such a device working doesn't really mean anything. And they never actually put the phone up to their ear to check and see of they are wrong. Being wrong just isn't an option.

 

 

And then you can be content with models and concepts as from Mermin's article like:

 

You can "organize events" like distorted planet shapes and distances between stars which deny astronomy, because they are "abstract geometric constructions" and don't need to correspond to the (again excuse the ontology)... "real world."

 

Except they don't deny astronomy. You haven't asked astronomers about relativity, just as you've never made the measurement you say can't be true — you're just making that up. That's all based on a particular world view — an ideology based on a philosophical viewpoint you've decided must be correct. All of these posts have been almost exactly the same pattern as arguing with a creationist, for all the same underlying reasons.

[tar]

ydoaPs

 

Sorry, that last post of mine was meant to append to the previous one. I did not realize others were posting as I typed.

 

I have more knowledge of my own philosophies than of Kant's. Granted. But I am "conversing" with him through the pages of one of his books, and I am not "ignorant" of his thoughts. Since I have not yet grasped fully what he "means" by all he has said, I will grant you the possibility that I might not yet have "gotten" it. But please allow that I might have an inkling of knowledge on the subject, and that Kant was saying more than one thing, and that Kant was attempting to lay down some ground rules for Metaphysics as well as say a bunch of other things about a bunch of stuff, each in their own context, and each with their grounds and conclusions, and each with their place and role in "the understanding".

 

And I don't remember Kant ever saying that there was not an elephant to intuit. Any idea you have that Kant was saying we were blind, therefore confined to darkness, I would have to question. Does not seem to me that that is what he means. Lack of certain, final, direct knowledge of the thing does not leave us without an inkling of a clue.

 

We can, within what I know of Kant's ideas, still be the blind men AND the person listening to the story.

 

 

Regards, TAR2

[owl]

Tar, if you knew any philosophy at all, you'd know ...

 

I'm obviously not a moderator, but this is yet another example of disrespectful and insulting crap which seems to be the norm here rather than respectful conversation about science and the relevance of philosophy to science, if any.

 

You are saying that Tar is totally ignorant of philosophy, because if he "knew any philosophy at all"... he would know better and agree with your understanding of Kant, in this case.

 

Your arguments make being flippant easy.

 

My arguments are mostly from epistemology and ontology and the philosophy of realism which does not believe that the shape of planets and the distances between stars all depend on how they are observed, which is idealism. You still don't get that part.

Plus, you seem to agree with what's his name in the opening post, that "philosophy is bullshit" anyway, so you come to the philosophy section and insist that physics according to your beliefs is the only truth and all this philosophy about it is just a bunch of crap anyway.

 

It would seem that the ones asking are not the ones doing any science. So why should I care? You still have not provided me with a list of science that has been shown not to work based on philosophical objections.

 

Many of the "ones asking" are well credentialed scientists and some are philosophers of science well respected by their physics colleagues, also interested in the ontological nature of "spacetime," etc. You are trashing them all in one broad brushstroke. It speaks more about you and your harsh judgment of ontology than about them.

 

It doesn't take a list to make the point, though I've given many examples that you have ignored. Claiming that Earth is or could be nearly flat or that the distance to the Sun or Alpha Centauri is extremely different than all astronomical measurements of them, all based on length contraction... does not work in the real world.

 

That's right. It doesn't matter. What matters is that the models work.

 

It matters to those who have published papers on the ontology of spacetime, whether you agree with them or whether you think it matters at all. You do not personally get to decide for everyone what matters and what doesn't.

 

No one will will say how the model of curved spacetime works or how the math would be different without the word "spacetime" (or fairies or fuzzy fabrics/pelts or 'whatever' metaphysical concepts.) Cap 'n R just admits that he doesn't know (how the math would be different without the words.) How about you?

 

The way we know is that the model predicts future observations and fits current observations to the level of precision that we can measure.

...

 

...(I am not questioning the other fields of science you mention.)

"To the level of precision that we can measure," Earth's shape is precisely known, and it is not squished nearly flat, and the Sun is, on average, 93 million miles away, and Alpha Centauri is 4.3 light years away. Theories that claim that the above measurements are wrong, or just one version of many valid measurements in each case... do not fit the repeatedly and precisely observed astronomical facts.

The description of this physics as "total nonsense" and the observation of "astounding!" evokes an image of someone being told of a technology that's new to them, like a cell phone or even a regular phone back in the day, and they are told that if they talk into it, someone far away would be able to hear them, and they would be able to hear the other person. But it doesn't fit their experience and they decide it can't possibly work. They would call it total nonsense. You think that such a device is real? Astounding! Things don't happen like that in the real world! But, of course, just because they can't conceive of such a device working doesn't really mean anything. And they never actually put the phone up to their ear to check and see of they are wrong. Being wrong just isn't an option.

 

What I called total nonsense is belief that Earth and the planets are or may be squished nearly flat, in total denial of all scientific evidence to the contrary, just because a quirky sub-theory within SR says so.

There is an obvious difference between the two examples, even though you seem to think it is spot on relevant.

 

Except they don't deny astronomy. You haven't asked astronomers about relativity, just as you've never made the measurement you say can't be true — you're just making that up. That's all based on a particular world view — an ideology based on a philosophical viewpoint you've decided must be correct. All of these posts have been almost exactly the same pattern as arguing with a creationist, for all the same underlying reasons.

 

Actually, all the astronomy sites I have ever visited, authored by many different astronomers, verify the measurements (and Earth shape) I have been using in my argument against length contraction. You remain in complete denial of all this body of evidence because of your extreme adherence to *dogmas* that say "there are no preferred frames of reference" and "lightspeed is invarient (relative to what?) so length (including shape) must be variable with frame of observation." Ergo, all above astronomy is subject to and subordinate to length contraction theory.

 

I have no such dogmatic belief, and it seems to me that you fit the dogmatist profile much better than I.

 

Even the Big Bang cosmology that everything in the universe came from nothing (where did it come from?) is no different than creationism, that it all appeared magically out of god's magic hat.

Not that you subscribe to that cosmology, but many that call themselves scientists do.

[Cap'n Refsmmat]

It matters to those who have published papers on the ontology of spacetime, whether you agree with them or whether you think it matters at all. You do not personally get to decide for everyone what matters and what doesn't.

The question for this thread is whether philosophy is relevant to science. As a scientist, swansont gets to decide.

 

Actually, all the astronomy sites I have ever visited, authored by many different astronomers, verify the measurements (and Earth shape) I have been using in my argument against length contraction. You remain in complete denial of all this body of evidence because of your extreme adherence to *dogmas* that say "there are no preferred frames of reference" and "lightspeed is invarient (relative to what?) so length (including shape) must be variable with frame of observation." Ergo, all above astronomy is subject to and subordinate to length contraction theory.

Have any of those astronomers made measurements while traveling near the speed of light relative to Earth?

 

You should really stop using this example, since it blatantly does not contradict any prediction of relativity.

[tar]

Owl,

 

Cap'n has a real good point.

 

The discussion is about where a scientist has used, does use and could continue to use philosophy, therefore consider philosophy "relevant".

 

It's not about where philosophy would make science irrelevant or wrong. Any argument in that direction would actually, in this context, be dismissive of science and the scientist and therefore not only very possibly untrue, but also very possibly misplaced.

 

Regards, TAR2

 

And as an aside, in general I would say that telling other people what they mean is probably dogmatic in nature, and I would "philosophically" suggest that it is better to look for what someone else means than to figure that somehow, you already know that they must be looking at it wrong.

 

Take the ole discussion of the two men standing next to each other "you are standing on my left", "no, no, no, you idiot, you are standing on my right".

[swansont]

My arguments are mostly from epistemology and ontology and the philosophy of realism which does not believe that the shape of planets and the distances between stars all depend on how they are observed, which is idealism. You still don't get that part.

 

On the contrary, that is loud and clear and has been for a long time now. You are arguing from the standpoint of some ideology — what you believe — and aren't letting facts get in the way. You won't accept any scientific results that contradict your world view and are willing to misrepresent (or simply not learn) the science in order to make things fit, which is why this reminds me so much of arguing with creationists.

 

 

Plus, you seem to agree with what's his name in the opening post, that "philosophy is bullshit" anyway, so you come to the philosophy section and insist that physics according to your beliefs is the only truth and all this philosophy about it is just a bunch of crap anyway.

 

My position has been that ontology is separate from physics and that you can do physics without addressing ontology. And I do that, and so do a bunch of my fellow scientists, seeing as the science has advanced while the ontological question of spacetime has remained unanswered for about 100 years now and the ontological question of space and time unanswered before that.

 

Given your demands that the question must be answered, how is that possible?

 

Many of the "ones asking" are well credentialed scientists and some are philosophers of science well respected by their physics colleagues, also interested in the ontological nature of "spacetime," etc. You are trashing them all in one broad brushstroke. It speaks more about you and your harsh judgment of ontology than about them.

 

I'm not trashing them. I'm saying they aren't doing science when they are asking the question. Thinking about the question may help them do science, but than, so might meditation or drinking a cup of tea or working out at the gym. It's not for me to say how someone else gains insight. But it's not for you (or other philosophers) to say that a particular path must be followed, either.

 

It doesn't take a list to make the point, though I've given many examples that you have ignored. Claiming that Earth is or could be nearly flat or that the distance to the Sun or Alpha Centauri is extremely different than all astronomical measurements of them, all based on length contraction... does not work in the real world.

 

You have no basis for that claim, as it has not been tested. You "know" it doesn't work "in the real world" but that is really "I have a firm religious/philosophical belief that it won't work" but you haven't bothered to check. When someone points to a somewhat different experiment that shouldn't work if you are right (e.g. muon decay in the atmosphere), somehow that isn't acceptable evidence for you and you hand-wave it away.

 

 

It matters to those who have published papers on the ontology of spacetime, whether you agree with them or whether you think it matters at all. You do not personally get to decide for everyone what matters and what doesn't.

 

In term of preferences, I get to decide what matters to me. I can observe whether it matters to advancing science. You STILL have not been able to explain how not addressing the ontological question has prevented scientific advancement, but I understand — it hasn't. Scientific progress has been made, trivially falsifying your position (I refute it thus!). I don't understand how you can continue to insist that physics must address the ontological question.

 

No one will will say how the model of curved spacetime works or how the math would be different without the word "spacetime" (or fairies or fuzzy fabrics/pelts or 'whatever' metaphysical concepts.) Cap 'n R just admits that he doesn't know (how the math would be different without the words.) How about you?

 

Why would the math be any different if you changed the name? Let's call it Fred. Fred is a four-dimensional manifold that is curved in the presence of mass. Light follows geodesic paths on Fred.

 

 

...(I am not questioning the other fields of science you mention.)

"To the level of precision that we can measure," Earth's shape is precisely known, and it is not squished nearly flat, and the Sun is, on average, 93 million miles away, and Alpha Centauri is 4.3 light years away. Theories that claim that the above measurements are wrong, or just one version of many valid measurements in each case... do not fit the repeatedly and precisely observed astronomical facts.

 

Theories do NOT claim those measurements are wrong. That you continue along this line of argument means you do not understand relativity (much like a creationist not understanding evolution). All of the measurements have been made in one frame of reference, in accordance with the theory.

 

 

What I called total nonsense is belief that Earth and the planets are or may be squished nearly flat, in total denial of all scientific evidence to the contrary, just because a quirky sub-theory within SR says so.

There is an obvious difference between the two examples, even though you seem to think it is spot on relevant.

 

It is in denial of no evidence, and if you think that length contraction is a "quirky sub-theory" within SR, you have your facts wrong.

 

 

Actually, all the astronomy sites I have ever visited, authored by many different astronomers, verify the measurements (and Earth shape) I have been using in my argument against length contraction. You remain in complete denial of all this body of evidence because of your extreme adherence to *dogmas* that say "there are no preferred frames of reference" and "lightspeed is invarient (relative to what?) so length (including shape) must be variable with frame of observation." Ergo, all above astronomy is subject to and subordinate to length contraction theory.

 

The measurement of any of these values is not an argument against length contraction. That's the problem. I don't deny the evidence. The measurements were all made from a single frame of reference — there is no reason to expect to see length contraction. But check these astronomy websites for things like gravitational redshift measurements — another effect of relativity. Astronomy/Astronomers do not reject relativity.

 

I have no such dogmatic belief, and it seems to me that you fit the dogmatist profile much better than I.

 

I am loath to pull of the d-word, but you contradict yourself. You admit that you have decided that realism is true. All pronouncements based on that is, in fact, dogma.

 

Even the Big Bang cosmology that everything in the universe came from nothing (where did it come from?) is no different than creationism, that it all appeared magically out of god's magic hat.

Not that you subscribe to that cosmology, but many that call themselves scientists do.

 

Whatever.

[md65536]

Why would the math be any different if you changed the name? Let's call it Fred. Fred is a four-dimensional manifold that is curved in the presence of mass. Light follows geodesic paths on Fred.

I have a feeling that this is the one point that will be taken from all your replies in this post, and that 6 months from now we'll be hearing about how "Science thinks that what spacetime really 'is' is pink fairies living on a rabbit pelt named Fred."

[charles brough]

To me, the subject of philosophy is a study of the history of theory until the about the last century when theory became more specialized to particular sciences. Astrophysics is more theory than physics, for example, and the social sciences build a data base which is interpreted by social theorists to concoct their theory of the world which is thought of as being our secularized way of thinking.

 

To me, modern philosophers are the history-of-philosophy-loving professional students and academics who enjoy building up ivory tower edifaces of abstractions for the sole intent of carrying on a tradition that is now obsolete.

 

I'm sorry about that but I just left another forum where someone claimed the social sciences are not science but philosophy. I guess I lost my tempter. . .

 

brough

http://civilization-overview.com